[Foundation-l] Board resolutions on controversial content and images of identifiable people

[Kim Bruning]

On Thu, Aug 25, 2011 at 12:10:12PM -0700, phoebe ayers wrote:
> On Tue, Aug 23, 2011 at 8:14 AM, Kim Bruning <kim at bruning.xs4all.nl> wrote:
> > I would then like to point out that there is no practical way to
> > make a value-neutral categorisation scheme to use for filtering.
> 
> 
> 
> This seems like an over-hasty statement. There are many possible
> categorization schemes that are neutral; 

Labels designed for other purposes need not be prejudicial, I agree. But then
I don't think they would be (as) suitable for use by a filter. 

> organizations have taken a stand against censorious and non-neutral
> labeling, not all labeling. If you keep reading the ALA page you linked, it
> says that the kind of labels that are not appropriate are when "the
> prejudicial label is used to warn, discourage or prohibit users or certain
> groups of users from accessing the material" -- e.g. a label that reads "not
> appropriate for children".

Well, as far as I can tell, any label that suggests "... and you might want to filter
this" falls under this definition of a prejudicial label that is used to warn
and discourage users (and may be used by 3rd parties to prohibit users).

Am I missing something?

> The Board didn't specify any particular mechanism or system in our
> resolution. 

Fair enough. So if we can get much of what some people want without
resorting to labelling, that'd be ok too?

> But after all, developing informative, neutral
> and useful systems for organizing information is something that the
> Wikimedia projects have become world-famous for -- so if anyone can do it I
> have faith that we can :)

I'm not sure I like the idea of developing an informative and useful system
for non-neutrality. I know we're not *deliberately* trying to do that, but the
discussion *does* keep crossing that line accidentally, and I kind of get quesy
easily. ^^;;

> As I told DGG, there's a lot of caveats in that resolution. And those
> caveats are there for a reason. It should not be extrapolated that the Board
> as a whole *actually* supports a particular, or different, or more
> censorious, filtering scheme. What we want is for people to easily be able
> to hide images for themselves if they don't want to see them when using our
> projects. (And we also want other things, like better tools for Commons,
> that are expressed in other parts of that resolution.)

*nod* I understand what is wanted. 

I just think that part of the discussion should be about the actual practical
feasibility of this aim within the limits of our foundation objectives. We've
been asking the wrong questions at the wrong times.

> I know we are all looking forward to seeing the referendum results, and the
> data from it will need to be carefully considered.

The data needs to be very, very carefully piped to /dev/null. 

The list of issues with the 'referendum' is too long to fit in the margin of
this foundation-l post.  Chief among those issues, however, is that it is not
a referendum. [1] 

To wit: it doesn't ask whether people accept or reject this proposal.

An example of something closer to a referendum on the topic can be found at
de.wikipedia at [2].

> In the meantime I am glad to see more discussion of this, but I am
> remembering that it is a stressful topic!

I think we're trying to fit too many angels on the heads of our pins. I'm kind
of worried, at what point will the angels fall off? O:-)

sincerely,
	Kim Bruning

[1] "A referendum (also known as a plebiscite or a ballot question) is a
direct vote in which an entire electorate is asked to either accept or reject
a particular proposal."  Referendum. (2011, August 23). In Wikipedia, The Free
Encyclopedia. Retrieved 22:06, August 25, 2011, from
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Referendum&oldid=446246705

[2] http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Meinungsbilder/Einf%C3%BChrung_pers%C3%B6nlicher_Bildfilter